The typical way to connect a golf club shaft and a golf club head is to epoxy the tip end of the golf club shaft into a bore formed within the hosel portion of the golf club head. Many golf shops offer a broad range of exotic shafts and club heads to meet the standards of today's demanding golfer.
To facilitate the ease in which various combinations of shafts and heads may be evaluated by the golfer, some golf equipment makers, such as Adams Golf, Callaway, Cobra, Cleveland, Mizuno, Nike, Taylor Made, Titleist and many others have devised connectors that rapidly secure a shaft and a club head together thereby making such clubs are referred to as “adjustable” clubs. Because these connectors are releasable, if the customer doesn't like the existing shaft and head combination the connector is simply released and a different shaft and head combination is secured for evaluation by the golfer.
In such adjustable club configurations, the connector used thereby is typically mounted on the club head and contains brand specific mounting features thereon.
In recent years there has been an increase industry wide of such connectors. As a result, each manufacturer that utilizes adjustable connectors has elected to employ a proprietary connector configuration that is not interchangeable with other brands of equipment. Some have “squared keyways”, “hexagon keyways”, “splines”, etc., and as a result. The result of such a configuration limits a user to only interchanging club heads and club shafts that are of the same brand. However, there are many instances where a user may prefer one brand of club shafts that is not the same brand as that user's preferred brand of club heads. In such instances, such users have heretofore been prevented from utilizing such a preferred combination because the brand specific connector portion situated on the club head will not mate with the differing brand specific connector portion situated on the club shaft. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for a universal connector for adjustable golf clubs.
The invention provides such a universal. These and other advantages of the invention, as well as additional inventive features, will be apparent from the description of the invention provided herein.